I read an interesting article in the Huffington Post regarding
the finance industry and social media. As a former banker, I can attest to my own
group’s lack of social media use to connect with and market to clients. According
to this article, this trend is changing. For example, currently “44% of the
Massachusetts’ investment advisers use at least one social media site,” which
is a significant increase from past usage. With the adoption of social media,
potential regulatory violations come into play, often because communications
are difficult to track. Many institutions still lack guidelines for employees
to follow when leveraging this new technology. This is of particular concern
for investment advisers who are providing stock recommendations for clients. “An
ongoing struggle for advisers is uncertainty over whether investors who click
the "like" button on an adviser's Facebook pages are effectively
giving testimonials, or a positive endorsement about the adviser.” Massachusetts actually issued a ruling on
this, stating that purely a Facebook like without commentary is not considered
expressing a testimonial. I agree with this ruling and believe that other
states should adopt similar guidelines. I do not feel that visitors to an
adviser’s Facebook page would typically sift through all the people that have “liked"
that adviser and as a result be influenced by that action. As long as comments
are not left in addition, there should not be restrictions against this action.
-Danielle Cervelli
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